People, Locations, Episodes

Ray Sprigle, Journalist born

*Ray Sprigle was born on this date in 1886. He was a white-American journalist and author. Ray Sprigle was born in Akron, Ohio, to parents of colonial Pennsylvanian German ancestry. He attended local schools. After his freshman year, he left Ohio State University and started working as a newspaper reporter and a freelance pulp fiction […]

René Maran, Writer born

*René Maran was born on this date in 1887. He was a Black French journalist, and the first black writer to win the renowned French literary prize, the Prix Goncourt.

Fenton Johnson, Chicago Poet born

*The birth of Fenton Johnson in 1888 is marked on this date. He was an African American poet and writer.

Chandler Owen, Writer, and Socialist born

*Chandler Owen was born on this date in 1889. He was a Black writer, editor, and early member of the Socialist Party of America.   Owen was born in Warrenton, North Carolina. He graduated from Virginia Union University in 1913. Later, while studying economics at Columbia University in 1916, he joined the Socialist Party of America. He began a lifelong friendship with A. Philip Randolph and they followed the […]

Pilar Barrios, Poet, and Journalist born.

*Pilar Barrios was born on this date in 1889. He was an Afro-Uruguayan poet. He was born in Rocha Department, Uruguay, with a brother, Ventura, and a sister, Maria, both writers. Barrios was an essential poet of the Black community of Uruguay and one of the founders of the Partido Autóctono Negro. His poetry demonstrated an understanding of […]

Willis Richardson, Playwright born

Willis Richardson, an African American playwright, was born on this date in 1889.

Born in Wilmington, N.C., he and his parents, Willis Wilder and Agnes Ann Harper Richardson, moved to Washington, D.C. shortly after the Wilmington Riots of 1898. The riots resulted in the death of 16 Blacks and affected Richardson as a child. Richardson’s father read to him as a young boy and encouraged his interest in books and writing.

Vivian G. Harsh, Librarian, and Historian born

Vivian Harsh was born on this date in 1890. She was an African American librarian, historian, and administrator, who made an important contribution to saving African American history.

Claude McKay, Author born

*This date marks the birthday of Claude McKay in 1890. He was an African American writer, born in Jamaica.

He was educated by his older brother, who owned a library of English novels, poetry, and scientific texts. At twenty, McKay published a book of verse called “Songs of Jamaica,” recording his impressions of Black life in Jamaica in dialect. In 1912, he traveled to the United States to attend Tuskegee Institute. He remained there only a few months, leaving to study agriculture at Kansas State University.

Zora Neale Hurston, Author born

Zora Neale Hurston, an African American writer and folklorist, was born on this date in 1891. She is best known for her 1937 novel, “Their Eyes Were Watching God.” In 2002, scholar Molefi Kete Asante listed Zora Neale Hurston on his list of 100 Greatest African Americans.

Born in Notasulga, AL, she grew up in Eatonville, FL., and was educated at Howard University, Barnard College, and Columbia University, where she studied anthropology. Hurston returned to Florida after college for an anthropological field study that influenced her later fiction and folklore.

Nella Larsen, Novelist born

Nella Larsen was born on this date in 1891. She was an African American novelist of the Harlem Renaissance and a landmark figure in the Black women’s literary tradition.

She was born Nellie Walker in Chicago. In 1909 Larsen left home to attend Fisk University. A year later she traveled to Denmark, and spent the next two years living with relatives and studying at the University of Copenhagen. Larsen studied nursing in New York, and in 1916 she returned south to Tuskegee Institute to become assistant superintendent of nurses.

Eugene Gordon, Journalist, and Writer born

*Eugene Gordon was born on this date in 1891. He was a Black journalist, editor, fiction writer, and social activist. Born in Oviedo, Florida, he was raised in New Orleans and lived through the Robert Charles riots. He attended Howard University and then Boston University, studying English and journalism. 1916, Gordon married Edythe Mae Chapman, a short […]

Frank Collymore, Writer born

*Frank Collymore was born on this date in 1893. He was a Afro Barbadian teacher, author, poet, stage actor and painter, whose nickname was “Barbadian Man of the Arts”.

Frank Appleton Collymore was born at Woodville Cottage, Chelsea Road (where he lived all his life). Collymore was close to his parents; he was a single child, for whom reading was a passion.

(Nathan) Jean Toomer, Author born

Nathan Eugene Pinchback Toomer was born on this date in 1894. He was an African American writer.

George Schuyler, Journalist born

*On this date, in 1895, George Schuyler was born. He was a Black author, journalist, and conservative social commentator after he had supported socialism.   George Samuel Schuyler was born in Providence, Rhode Island, to George Francis Schuyler, a chef, and Eliza Jane Schuyler. Schuyler’s paternal great-grandfather was believed to be a black soldier working for […]

Nancy Cunard, Political Activist born

*Nancy Cunard was born on this date in 1896. She was a white European writer, heiress, civil rights activist, and politician.   Nancy Clara Cunard was born into the British upper class; her father was Sir Bache Cunard, an heir to the Cunard Line shipping businesses, a polo and fox hunting enthusiast, and a baronet. Her mother was Maud Alice Burke, an American heiress who adopted the […]